Anchor
by The Raven Queen
Summary: Short sweet Juunana-gou fic. Rated for slight mature content. No lemon, no citrus and no romance. Juu is starting to feel things, and some one is helping him


Fanfiction Title: Anchor  
  
Author Name: The Raven Queen  
  
Email: displayed please ^_^  
  
Section: One shot/short story  
  
Main characters: Juunana-gou/nameless  
  
Original characters: nameless  
  
Summary: short sappy ficlet with no distinct purpose other than to make everyone feel warm and fuzzy inside. No citrus and no lemon involved. There's some one around That's making everyone's favourite bad guy feel a little odd. If you like romantic stuff you may like this.  
  
Anchor.  
  
A/N: Personally, I am very proud of myself for this little one shot. It is definitely one of my best works of fanfiction so far. The readers may think differently. But I am proud to say I have spelled checked this about thirty times and gone over the rules of grammar several times more, neither being my strong point. It might be sappy and hard to understand, but I can say my writing has definitely improved. My idea may not have, I try to be original. But for me, this kind of story is one of a kind. Take in the gravity of the moment *raises hands to the sky*  
  
On with the story.  
  
*  
  
Juunana-gou awoke with a start. Frowning at his bizarre dream, he sat up. Rubbing his eyes. For a moment he did not notice the warm figure beside him. A smile touched his lips as he remembered. She trusted him completely. Enough to sleep next to him without the slightest bit of fear. Perhaps her trust was misguided. For Juunana-gou was not the most moral of people. He did not find himself bound by the ethics and unspoken codes of decency these humans seemed to live by. But he had not betrayed her trust. Rather, the thought of proving her belief in him wrong rather disgusted him.  
  
She gave a little moan and curled against him. He didn't know why she bothered; he generated very little heat when he was in a resting state. Studying her, he took in the fresh bruises, the graze on her shoulder, exposed where her arm clasped the blanket to her chest. He felt fury swelling up inside him already. He knew if the maker of those bruises ever came near her again.he would kill the pathetic little human. Slowly.  
  
There once might have been a time when Juunana-gou would have been the one to make those bruises, enjoyed the fact that he had absolute power over the pathetically weak creature that lay beside him. But not any more. He was almost glad he had never gotten the chance to do to this world what Juuhachi-gou had told him their counterparts had to the future one. Almost.  
  
He did not appreciate the beauty of the earth, not the way Juroku-gou had, but he knew that it looked a dam sight better now than it would completely annihilated. And he had a dim sense that the figure beside him was beautiful. In his own, ordered, mechanical mind, he could recognize something in her that was distinctly attractive. Maybe it was the fact he was beginning to be able to actually feel the silkiness of her long ebony tresses, maybe it was because he felt a tiny twinge of something very unmechanical when he looked into the midnight blue of her eyes.  
  
He didn't know what any of it meant. But the feel of her so close to him gave him a little tremor of a thrill, and after a moment a deep sense of calm. It did not frighten him as it first had; he had grown used to her next to him.  
  
She seemed to draw a sort of strength from him, something that kept her from throwing herself off the nearest cliff. Something that kept her from simply refusing to wake up in the morning, that stopped her from slipping away in the night, to places he couldn't follow.  
  
He knew terrible things had happened to her. He could identify with that, with the deep ache that would never go away of being violated. He believed he had it worse, it was frustrating, to not even have memories of better times to cling to. To have no anchor at all. Nothing.  
  
It had been a while now. Since she had just staggered into his backyard, a tiny space cleared of trees, screaming for help with heavy footsteps behind her.  
  
He remembered the way she had thrown herself at him, promising anything if only he would hide her. He could still remember the faint smell of her blood, the terror in her eyes. And the weariness, the acceptance of death or worse when he had detached her hand from his arms, with a look of disgust on his face. The way she had sat there, in the dirt, trembling, with her arms around herself. Sobbing softly. He had stood there, watching her.  
  
The footsteps got closer. Watching her. For the first time in the life he could remember, Juunana-gou had felt something, a twinge of regret, of empathy maybe. He could smell her fear; it shivered out in waves. But she didn't move. She didn't run.  
  
Juunana-gou came back to the present when she suddenly muttered something and stretched out, full length, against him. She was dreaming, and from the expression on her face, it wasn't pleasant. She had nightmares all the time. Still, nightmares.they were better than the cold emptiness of sleep that he had to endure. Sometimes being asleep was more draining than being awake he reflected. His human components required it, but he did not like to sleep. Though he had to admit, sleeping had been much easier with her around.  
  
His internal clock told him it was a few hours before the sun was due to rise. And his other sense could feel rain in the air. Bad weather time again.  
  
She had never been around in the storm season, something she had told him. He wondered if it would scare her. The strangest things scared her, set off old memories he guessed. Things like that happened to him. Something would send a shiver of recognition into his mind; he would search the blank space. And find nothing, absolutely nothing. He had grown to hate those twinges, those moments of recognition, like little bubbles of gold in a black sea. He would reach out desperately, and just like that, they would pop. Gone forever.  
  
He watched her through a slanted eye, she was breathing quickly, her eyes shut tight and the ugly bruise on her cheek twisting as she scowled. Not in anger, but in fear, and hatred, and desperation and a hundred other emotions he would almost be glad to experience. He would be glad to exchange all that, anything other than the blankness, the void where identity, values, ties, connections, and affections should exist. Only a black raw need for something, anything, to feel.  
  
And slowly, with her around, more and more of his human side was coming out. He had learned to be gentle with her; she was fragile, emotionally, mentally, and physically.  
  
She was slowly bringing something new to him. He began to feel things, not big things, not powerful things. Just little touches of feeling here and there, a warmth when her hand touched his cheek, a protectiveness of her that had grown quickly, exponentially almost, since she had first fallen, sobbing, into his arms.  
  
Smiling, he felt her arms wrap around his mid section, she did this sometimes; she would cling to him like a little child, murmuring names and incoherent words. Her voice laced with a peaceful little grunt. It was the only time she seemed to be at peace.  
  
With a smile he felt her curl into his side, her small form fitting against his. Then, he heaved a sigh and closed his eyes. Slipping instantly into the black void of empty sleep.  
Welcome to the world Where time does not flow But creeps past me Trying to escape my frantic hold  
  
Distracting me for the moment Pulling my attentions away I cannot watch so carefully When my mind has gone astray  
  
Wandering into the world of humans Where I do not belong Watching from the outside With my hands against the glass  
It was some hours before he woke again. This time to the sound of birdsong. A smirk tugged at his lips as he felt her head on his chest. Another thing she did, she never seemed aware of it.  
  
She rolled over and moaned, drifting awake as she always did, slowly. He, being what he was, just clicked away. Just, awake. There was no peaceful drift into or out the darkness of sleep. His body required a certain amount. And he supplied it with a certain amount. And when it was done it woke him, unless something else did, like a threat to him. In this case, the first dream of the life he could remember.  
  
It had not been a nice dream, if anything, the fact he could remember it was a bad thing, leaving instead a little piece of feeling to make that void just a little less emptier. No, the fact he had to remember at all was cruel.  
  
It had been simply a memory, of first waking up into his new body. To his knowledge, humans had no cut off point where they could remember everything, instead it was more they had siftings of memories form early ages, some they could not identify, but they seemed to have that sense of history, and identity. That he was never privy to. They all knew where they came from. In some shape or form.  
  
And then there was her, she didn't want to remember where she came from. Or how she got to this new part in her life. She seemed to simply want to get as much out of it as she could, for however long it lasted.  
  
She rolled back to face him, and he was privileged to a rare smile, she didn't smile much, but she didn't scowl either. Her usual expression was a quiet, submissive one.  
  
"I had a dream," he informed her. Her face relaxed, unaccustomed to smiling  
  
"What about?" she asked in that soft voice of hers, it reminded him of the wind when it came whispering through the trees in the afternoons  
  
"It's not important"  
  
She nodded and turned over to get up. As she stood and stretched a little, lifting the back of her light top up slightly with the motion, he took in the bruising along her back. He made a note; he wouldn't let her go anywhere for a while, not while he could see those dam marks.  
  
Looking up at the ceiling he wondered vaguely if he should leave her alone at all. But he did have work to do. Juunana-gou considered this as she left the room, and returned a few minutes later with a steaming sup of coffee. She did this every morning.  
  
He accepted it silently and drank slowly as she disappeared again. She would be getting dressed now, in one of those plain blue and white shirts, and a pair of her loose, almost gi like pants.  
  
Juunana-gou got up slowly, pausing to pull on a shirt and a pair of pants over his boxers. The smells of breakfast were already wafting down the hall to him. Breathing it in, he wandered to the kitchen, to find her, as usual, setting plates down and cooking something.  
  
It was plain to see the way she flinched every time she lifted something; there were bruises along her knuckles and the backs of her hands. Watching silently, he scowled. Nobody, nobody, touched her. Nobody. He did not think of her as his woman, he had never attempted anything. The way she shivered and cringed when she had first thought he would.it had been sickening. The thought that some one would do that to a person.  
  
All Juunana-gou's life, the life he could remember anyway, had been spent in the pursuit of fun. He had never sought to destroy or cause pain, he simply took what he wanted and left. But this.  
  
His scowled darkened as she let out a little gasp; she had knocked her hip against the bench, no doubt finding another bruise. He moved around the table and walked up to her  
  
"Let me do it" he told her. Taking the sizzling pan from her hand, bottom first, and pushing her gently towards the table.  
  
The fact that heat did not bother him no longer surprised her. Setting it down he divided the strips of bacon she had salvaged from the wreck of groceries. She went shopping every few weeks. Taking his share he watched her chew hers, keeping her eyes fixed on the table. There was a long pause when he sat down.  
  
She was determined to avoid his gaze it seemed.  
  
"Who was it then?" the android's voice cut through the eerie silence. She didn't answer "Well?"  
  
Slowly she raised her dark eyes to meet the icy blue of his  
  
"An old..acquaintance"  
  
"What's his name?"  
  
She heaved a little sigh, muttering the name of a club he had seen in his flights over the city.  
  
"He's dead" Juunana-gou stated tonelessly. Pushing his chair back and standing up.  
  
"Please" she whispered, "Don't kill him"  
  
He was already halfway out the door. She did not get up, didn't try to stop him, they both knew there was no way in hell she stood a chance of that. But she was asking. There was a pause as he looked over his shoulder.  
  
Juunana-gou gave a short nod, and shot into the air.  
Dew runs down the windows Into that complex world My heart pulls me towards it But I know better  
  
The world of humans Where nothing is real Would infect my protected Utopia And lay waste to it's fragile balance  
  
The sky would weep for the blood Shed on that scared ground If the world of humans ever saw The temple of what I see.  
It was half an hour later that Juunana-gou stepped through the door. To find her curled up in a chair, reading a book. It escaped him how she managed to find so many. She read all the time. Coming to stand in front of her, he watched as her eyes rose to meet his  
  
"You didn't.?" her voice was soft and pleading, the midnight of her gaze sending little spears of.something.through his chest  
  
"No, but if he ever tries anything again, he won't be breathing for long" Juunana-gou told her.  
  
"Thank you" her gaze dropped again. The android came to sit next to her; pulling a chair over to the wickerwork piece she looked so small and fragile in. Reaching over he took her chin between his thumb and forefinger, raising her face to meet his icy blue stare. The cut on her mouth looked no better, she had cleaned out the gravel and dirt, but the swelling had gone up. The large bruise around her eye was turning a darker shade of purple and the grazing on the left side of her face had turned red and purple. Overall she looked much worse for wear, and that was only on her face.  
  
"Where else did he hit you?"  
  
She dropped her eyes. And slowly pulled away to lift the hem of her shirt, revealing a deep bruise of her stomach and several swollen spots on her ribs. He had already seen her back and arms, the deep hand shaped marks, and the grazing where she had fallen. And where he had kicked her, just once, enough to break several ribs.  
  
He was angry again, but he left it. Letting her pull her shirt back down.  
  
"You're going to a doctor," he told her. She sighed and shook her head. This was the one point she always balked on. He had tried several times in the past; she refused to see a doctor or any such person. He did not know why, only from her trademark expression of fear that she had a deep mistrust of the medical profession. Juunana-gou couldn't blame her, it had been a doctor that had screwed his whole existence, to the point he couldn't go forwards, or backwards, he was stuck forever in one way, shape and form. There were no such things as growing up for him. There was a long pause. Until he insisted "Yes you are"  
  
"No, I can't" she said, her voice rising a little, into the tone she only ever used when she wasn't going to back down.  
  
Ten minutes later he gave up.  
  
It had been a year since he had first brought her into his house. Watched her tremble, leaning against the wall. Told her to get into the next room when there was a bang at the door.  
  
He still remembered the face of the man standing there when he answered it. And what he said  
  
"Ye seen a girl come past here?" and his answer  
  
"No, only my girlfriend, turned up a few hours ago, she comes by every now and again" he said smoothly.  
  
"Well, we're looking for a girl, we're.friends of hers, she's in.trouble, we have to find her quick" Juunana-gou nodded, mentally matching this to the bruised and bleeding female in his house. The bald man shifted, he could see his large hands clenching. "Yeah well. If you see her, little thing, five foot six, skinny, black hair blue eyes, tell her Joe's got something for her"  
  
His eyes traveled down to see the blood on the bald man's fist, and the snake tattoo winding around his wrist  
  
"Sure will," he said smoothly. Shutting the door.  
  
She was reading again now. It would take weeks for the marks to go away. He would have to be reminded of how pitifully mortal she was until they went away, hopefully without leaving a scar.  
  
Sitting beside her, his arm resting next to hers, he shared a long silence. The fire was going; the cold affected her a lot, especially at times like this. When she was already battling being beaten half to death.  
  
He decided it was time to get some work done. Getting up, he paused to smile at her, sitting there, looking for all the world like she belonged on his lap with his arms curled around her, and her head on his shoulder. Then he touched the top of her head for a second, and moved to the door, grabbing his axe, and left.  
  
And as he lifted into the air, a smile touched his lips.  
  
To know she would be there, waiting for him when he returned.  
  
END  
  
A/N: Ok, firstly, this is not meant to be romantic in any way. It's just a little fic about dear old Juunana-gou gaining some sort of identity, an anchor without his sister around all the time. Personally I think it puts him just a wee bit out of character, but he's meant to be growing and maturing ^_^. Besides, it's cute to see him protective of a girl *Big sappy smile. Aww* And no. She is NOT meant to have a name. I did that on purpose.  
  
Reviews make my fingers type faster. If you like this story, tell me and I'll write more just for you.  
  
^_^ *reviews* ^_^ *reviews* ^_^ *reviews* ^_^ *reviews* ^_^ *reviews* ^_^ 


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